Tempork

Tempork (a contraction of "Temporary Aporkalypse") is the name given to any temporary world that is officially part of Aporkalypse. Tempork generally uses the latest Minecraft version and all creations in a Tempork are temporary. In the past, a Tempork was usually put online temporarily in place of the Aporkalypse server while it underwent upgrading and testing work.

Tempork and You

Due to the way Notch obscures the Minecraft code, it can take some time for all of the custom plugins and mods to be functional with the latest version. The Aporkalypse will stay on the last stable release until TooMuchPete gives the go-ahead to update our clients and help test out The Aporkalypse while everyone is running the latest Minecraft version. If the tests are successful, The Aporkalypse will be updated to the latest version without the need for a temporary server. However, if the tests show that The Aporkalypse still needs some work, TooMuchPete will start a brand new world running on the latest version of Minecraft so that the community doesn't suffer from withdrawal.

One side benefit of Tempork is that it always uses the latest Minecraft version. This gives us a great way to test new Minecraft features, items, and capabilities in a sandboxed setting before carrying them over to the permanent Aporkalypse world, where problems might arise if they had been implemented without considering the overall effect on Aporkalypse itself.

FAQ

Q. What is the difference between Tempork and Apork?

A. The main difference between Tempork and Apork is that Tempork always starts from scratch with no pre-existing buildings, infrastructure, or artwork. Players also start with an empty inventory the first time they visit Tempork. The majority of the plugins available on The Aporkalypse don't work, including hubs, /who or /playerlist, /repair, /spawn, /sethome, and /home. On some occasions, however, a few commands might be temporarily activated. The moderators often do not have any special powers and the authorization process may not work, so it is possible that anyone might join and start building. The griefing potential is higher than on the normal server so a good rule of thumb is to not get too attached to whatever you’re building. All of the normal rules and expectations are still in place on Tempork, and violations will ultimately be dealt with by Pete or will come into force when Aporkalypse returns. Good behavior and community spirit on the temporary server by new players are always noted by the moderators and staff, however, and will still count towards membership.

Q. How long will the Tempork stick around?

A. No one knows for sure. It will be when TooMuchPete and the other coders deem that the performance of the various mods and plugins is acceptable. There is no set deadline and TooMuchPete is great at keeping the community updated on the progress so there is no need to make a lot of status update posts. A look at previous incarnations of Tempork shows that they are typically online for 1 to 2 weeks.

Q. What happens to The Tempork after The Aporkalypse is back up and running?

A. It goes up to the great hot dog cart in the sky, never to be played again officially. Aporkalypse always picks up exactly where it left off, meaning that Tempork is always temporary and no part of it is ever resurrected.

Q. I want to help bring The Aporkalypse back up and running!

A. TooMuchPete will post a message if any help is needed. He usually makes a post a few hours before any stress testing occurs and this is the perfect time to chip in. Historically, the server has been tested around 9pm EST and all communication / bug reports take place in our IRC channel.

The Tempork series

The first of the temporary worlds were just known as "Tempork", taking the place of the server while it was offline, and are listed here. For detailed information refer to the Tempork data sheet.

The first Tempork was put online 20 December 2010 following extensive griefing of Spawn by a disgruntled player[1]. It was originally retired 27 December 2010, but brought back again in January, and retired again on 20 January 2011.
It featured a fairly spread out community, but near spawn there was a small mock village with houses made out of various material themes, such as wood, wool, chests, furnaces, etc.
This Tempork featured a draft of the Taj Mahal that now exists on the Aporkalypse, although it was unable to be completed before this Tempork was retired. Another big community project was the digging of a huge bowl in a nearby ocean. (if anyone has more information on what was in this Tempork version, please add)

Tempork II (peaceful mode) ran from 23 February through 8 March 2011. It saw the first appearance of a "Big Room" project in connection with the community mine; this Big Room was one of the largest ever constructed and measured about 200 x 40 x 25 meters in size. It was the inspiration for the permanent Big Room near Sunrise, which was constructed immediately after Tempork II was retired. Tempork II also resulted in one of the most extensive and urbanized cities ever built, similar in scale to Porkton and New Ham. It included the original Lakeview Community, an art district, a hillside district, Shanty Town, The Wastelands, a pirate cove, an Eiffel Tower, and a labyrinth. An extensive tram system with large aerial turns, hills, and scenic routes was built and came to be known as the "roller coaster". There were also numerous structures in the surrounding rural areas that included a chessboard. One notable event in Tempork II was the accidental destruction of the Reading Rainbow Library when decorative lava got out of control. A map of Tempork II can be viewed here.

Tempork III (survival mode) was launched 19 April 2011 due to the Minecraft 1.5 release. It was a relatively dark and brooding Tempork incarnation due to the addition of weather and thunderstorms and the introduction of hostile mobs, which appeared in large numbers. During the first couple of hours, Spawn was cratered several times and numerous founding members found themselves in life-or-death battles to keep monsters out of the community area. Eventually a large city wall was constructed around the city, which was founded on a sloping land alongside a beach. The city was much smaller than that which appeared in the previous Tempork version, but was serviced by a small tram system. The Big Room project appeared once again and was enhanced by a massive mob grinder project led by btford. Tempork III went to the great hot dog cart in the sky on 25 April 2011.

Tempork IV (survival mode) was put online 1 June 2011 due to the release of Minecraft 1.6. It is distinctive from previous worlds in that the new world was situated in flat land amongst grassland and sand biomes, and the netherworld was made available. However unlike previous Tempork releases, a centralized city did not appear, and projects were divided between a loose aggregation of topside builds near spawn, expansion of the Big Room, a small community in the nether, and a number of "secret" rural projects. After a near-3-week run, Tempork 4 went to the great hot dog cart in the sky on June 17.

Tempork V (survival mode) was launched 13 October 2011 at pork.minetato.com, running 1.9 pre-release 4 on Hard difficulty. Spawn was in a desert biome and was named Discordia. Players got their first experience with potions and the Ender dimension. The biggest build in this server was the Syncinnati community city. There was also a major project to excavate a stronghold from the rock in which it was embedded. This world was retired in late December 2011 with the rollout of the original Aporkalypse world.

Tempork VI (survival mode) was launched 25 June 2013, running 1.6 pre-rerelease. This returns to the original style of Temporks, being neither a Beans (parallel) nor a Pigdig (resources) world.

Beans (RETIRED)

Secondary test worlds came online starting in late summer 2011, going by the name "beans" (a word play on Pork And Beans, with Pork being Aporkalypse/Tempork [primary] and Beans being the test server [secondary]). Most beans servers ran at beans.minetato.com. A few of them, like Beans 2 and Beans 3, became unusually active and were greatly preferred for day-to-day Minecrafting action.

This was a bukkit test server (beans.minetato.com) which was put online 19 August 2011. Spawn was in a snow biome set amongst a series of ice lakes. Very little development took place due to Aporkalypse still being operational. The world was replaced September 16 with the Boston version of Beans.

Beans (survival mode) was put online 16 September 2011 at beans.minetato.com. It was meant as a testbed for Minecraft 1.8 while Aporkalypse lay dormant at the 1.7.3 version. The village of Boston (Beantown) was quickly founded, along with the cliffside community of Oberlake. It ran concurrently with a Tempork. Beans/Boston was retired 23 November 2011.

This test server came online on 23 November 2011. It featured a 10 km Intersnout that became a nucleus for many outlying builds, including the legendary Terrarium in the desert, a Saturn V rocket, Montana de Espantajaros, and more. Development slowed significantly in late December when the original Aporkalypse came back online, and it was taken offline on 12 January 2012.

This test server came online 12 January 2012 in order to test Minecraft 1.1. It was taken down sometime around April or May 2012.

Reporkalypse (ACTIVE)

Temporkalypse put online on May 24, 2012 with the release of Minecraft 1.2. At the time, the Aporkalypse server was considered to be broken by all the upgrades and it was announced that Reporkalypse, would take its place permanently. On August 4, 2012, Aporkalypse was put back online and was paired with Reporkalypse to become part of a multi-verse setup. Reporkalypse was never a Tempork world but was always a primary one.

Pigdig (RETIRED)

Pigdig is a Tempork incarnation that was created with the release of Minecraft 1.3 to provide a source of new resources for those who don't want to do destructive mining on Repork and Apork or have to look for new chunks. Except for the basic server rules and respect for others' property, which always applies, there are absolutely no aesthetic expectations in Pigdig. Wholesale strip mining, TNT parties, forest fires, and giant pit mines are allowed anywhere, including near Spawn. Jump in and get messy!

Pigdig 1. The first Pigdig was created August 4, 2012 running Minecraft V1.3 server. It was expected to be reset in November or December 2012 with the upgrade of the server to V1.4.

Other pigdig worlds were created in 2013, but we lost count of them. There were probably 2 or 3 additional ones.